Home Opener

Dear Mr. Moreno,

My Los Angeles Dodgers, who reside in Los Angeles, won an exciting home opener game in the 9th inning on a bases loaded single by Milton Bradley. The final score was 9 – 8.

In related news, I now have a new job in Orange County which takes me more than an hour drive to arrive from Chinatown – and thats carpooling. I’m about 10 minutes away from Angel Stadium. Sorry, I still can’t bring myself to calling your team the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim.

10 Replies to “Home Opener”

Bill sorry about the commute, it’s the same problem in the other direction.

Welcome to the OC. Our politics are backwards, we don’t have good mass transit, and we have industrial parks and housing tracts as far as the eye can see.

Don’t worry about the name of the Angels. I think Moreno is starting to get the message that the local OC fans are pissed. During the game it’s like watching a team of nomads with no pride in their home city. The announcer dosen’t even mention L.A. or Anaheim when they announce the team.

I was watching TV over the weekend when I surfed over to baseball. I saw the Angels so I watched a little. Then I noticed the “LAA” abbreviation by the score, and I just thought “aw man, they really went through with that?” As if my constant attempts to put the story out of my head the last few months actually worked.

The LA Times had an article in the California section about a couple guys who are selling Anti-LA shirts at the OC Swapmeet.

Moreno apparently approached one of them at a game and didn’t think about the shirt. When David Skonezny asked Moreno what he though about the shirts, he responded “Oh, there nice.” Moreno then followed it up with a simple, “well thanks for attending the game.”

At opening night I saw a number of them in the stands. The red shirts support the team and also serves to show our displeasure with the name change.

The shirts are availible at http://www.dropla.com (Maybe someone in New York will create a Brooklyn Dodgers of Los Angeles Shirt?)

If you look at it a certain way – perhaps this name change will be a longterm success for the Anaheim/OC based fans (or fans who don’t need another LA team for which to root). The more people who get angry just because they’re being geographically miscategorized, the more people will probably show up to the game with various message t-shirts. Large scale national story ensues. Viewership goes up. Money rolls in. Guy changes name – proves a market exists – everyone wins.

Art, yea, I’ve heard the critism about how the dodgers are originally from brooklyn and that the jets and giants don’t play in NY. But the big dif is that LA actually welcomed the dodgers and have taken them as their own. I assume the fine state of NJ don’t mind the Jets or Giants coming over since it was never their team to begin with (although I don’t really know their history). Mr. Moreno shouldn’t be ashamed of just being the Anaheim Angels.

Yours Truly: your cash is in the mail (wrapped up tightly in paper in a medium size envelope). And thanks.